How can you love something you have never seen? What sort of love is this? Aren't you just enamoured by pictures and words? You cannot love someone you have not had any contact with. Name me one person in this world you have never seen or heard from that you "love"? If you can't do this then why do you claim to "love" your Jesus? Why should anyone not believe you are delusional?

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People are 'erroneously confident' in their knowledge and underestimate the odds that their information or beliefs will be proved wrong. They tend to seek additional information in ways that confirm what they already believe. Max Bazenman, Harvard University

Fool, I asked you a specific question about Jesus, and you have not provided me a single example of Jesus calling himself divine.

I believe Jesus was a real person who walked the earth 2,000 years ago. I believe he brought a message of keeping Gods laws. I believe he was interested in teaching people to love their neighbor and honor God.

I do not believe the he considered himself God, and I would like you to answer the question. Where in The Bible did Jesus specifically say that he was God, or divine, like God?

It's not possible to prove God outside the bible since Jesus as the name of God is also from the bible.

It's not possible to prove god/jesus with the bible either, as subjective information cannot be deemed evidence. Could you prove Harry Potter, James Bond, or Winnie the Pooh with the books written about them. Get serious please and think!

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We theists have no evidence for our beliefs. So no amount of rational evidence will dissuade us from those beliefs. - JCisall

It would be pretty piss poor brainwashing, if the victims knew they were brainwashed, wouldn't it? - Screwtape. 04/12/12

OP, did jesus have a rectum, and did he poop? If he did, was it always correct solid, tube-shaped poo or did he sometimes get the runs? Was he ever out of commission for a day or two, not able to do miracles because he was tied up at the hole in the ground? Additonal, did he ever smell like faeces?

Actually my point is very relevant. I assumed that since you were talking about your favorite fictional character, I could talk about mine.

Oh, then it was a simple mistake. I'm not talking about a fictional character.

Do you see now how your point was irrelevant to this thread?

There are no contemporary sources for the existence of the biblical Jesus that corroborate the biblical narrative. It's no different than any other stories written about mythological gods and heroes who never existed.

The historical evidence of people having met Jesus are the Gospels of the New Testament, and the references to persons in other parts of the New Testament. It would be extraordinary for people to agree as a group to write about a person claimed to be real if that person was not actually real.

It would not be extraordinary if those people were attempting to promote their own agenda, such as the spread of their religion.

The bible is not historical evidence of the reality of a person named Jesus unless you have evidence from contemporary outside sources that the biblical narrative is correct. Your reasoning is circular. What you are in essence saying is "The bible says that Jesus is real, so Jesus is real because the bible says so."

It's not possible to prove God outside the bible since Jesus as the name of God is also from the bible. If someone proves God outside the bible where will be the link? How will one tell whether it's Jesus or another?By refuting the scriptures, the Atheists have ligatured their faculty of ever knowing God. No wonder they are atheists.

"ligatured"? I'm curious if you can explain what you mean. I know what "ligature" means. I suspect you don't.

If I have evidence to show that the Christian bible is untrue, and I can since there is no evidence for any of the unique events claimed in it, I have indeed shown that there is a reason to disbelieve any claim by it and those who claim to follow its god. If you wish to claim that your god is something different so you don't have to deal with the problems of the bible, that's no suprise. Most theists want to invent their own god so they can be sure it agrees with them.

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"There is no use in arguing with a man who can multiply anything by the square root of minus 1" - Pirates of Venus, ERB

Jesus is real, because people claim he was real, and wrote books about their claims.

The Easter Bunny must be real, too then by this logic. I mean, doesn't the Easter bunny originate with Eostre, which in its mythology had a deity that was half or a whole rabbit? People believed this being existed, so, by your logic since people believed it, they wrote stories on it ('cause how else would we know about such an entity) it must be true.

Do you see how stupid what you said is? I doubt it.

Quote

It is too extraordinary for me to think that their claims are entirely invalid.

Do you say the same thing for everything else? You must live in such a wonderful world where extraordinary is absolute truth!

When he said "Nobody fucks with the Jesus", did he mean that in a sexual or non-sexual manner?

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He never pays attention, he always knows the answer, and he can never tell you how he knows. We can't keep thrashing him. He is a bad example to the other pupils. There's no educating a smart boy.-– Terry Pratchett, Thief of Time

I have a question. Christians maintain the belief that Jesus' life, death, and resurrection was the key to God's forgiveness of human sin and salvation. Why, exactly, did these events have to occur in order for God to forgive humans of anything? What is the relevance of:a) the life, death, and resurrection of a divine entity manifested in the flesh (Jesus), to

b) A God's his attitude towards human sin.

'Cause honestly, I see absolutely no causal relevance of a) to b). If God wanted to forgive humans, why didn't he just do it, why were the events described in a) a prerequisite to forgiveness?

Fool replies to everything except this post. Funny that. It's the number one smoking hole in his little fantasy. It makes no sense.

I have a question. Christians maintain the belief that Jesus' life, death, and resurrection was the key to God's forgiveness of human sin and salvation. Why, exactly, did these events have to occur in order for God to forgive humans of anything? What is the relevance of:a) the life, death, and resurrection of a divine entity manifested in the flesh (Jesus), to

b) A God's his attitude towards human sin.

'Cause honestly, I see absolutely no causal relevance of a) to b). If God wanted to forgive humans, why didn't he just do it, why were the events described in a) a prerequisite to forgiveness?

Yes he's run off. But not forever. That's what's so annoying with these types; quite terrifying too. They are complete cowards. And they don't have a shred of integrity or honesty in them.

He's just been spoonfed with exactly what he asked for. At first he "answered" a specifically cherry-picked list of questions. By "answered" I mean addressed vaguely and unsatisfactory, or completely ignored in a haze of useless babble completely irrelevant to the question.

As I was reading through the responses to the OP, I came across the one I quoted a few posts above. I knew, in my heart(!), that Fool would not touch this; or if he did it'd be a long off topic rant filled with emotional make-believe. Surprise surprise, I was right.

That post embodies exactly what I have been railing on at for years. Jesus and the whole point of Christianity MAKES NO SENSE. It is NONsense. A god making up ways to kill himself to satisfy himself so he can forgive his own creations by his own standards....

That point alone utterly destroys Christianity. And it's the very thing every slimy, dishonest, weaseling, foolish, coward who tries to defend this shit absolutely refuses to address. The whole Christian religion is the biggest display of immorality I've ever seen. You can't believe it without being a liar, a coward, or just plain ignorant.

Why do you think Fool chose the name he did?

My theory is he got really fucked up on Christohol and decided that he'd been a fool all his life for not seeing the so obvious truth of the 2,000 year old zombie carpenter man-god hybrid.

The conception of Mary was Immaculate, as noted in the Catholic Dogma. This proves that your god could wipe away original sin. Why send a human son to suffer one of the bloodiest and most immoral executions to forgive this sin when he's already wiped it away once?

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2nd of all, if all you believe in is peer-reviewed papers, you won't go very far in life...

17 hours ago I left this thread to go to sleep, which by God's wisdom humbles me daily with its requirements. I have since eaten, gone to class, inspected a home that my wife and I might be purchasing, gone through the market district to make a grocery trip, and gone to the library to check out a book. Shortly I will be studying for my classes for the rest of the week.

I don't understand why some of you think that I am cowardly for not having the resources to attend to this thread twenty four hours a day, but I will do my best to answer the questions with time. You should probably also be aware that I have over twenty thousand posts on this site before the new forums took effect, and am approaching ten thousand posts on another atheist website. So, though I am a proud sinner who needs God's grace constantly to be a civil person, I'm not emotionally thin skinned or ignorant of your arguments.

So, give me the same grace you give yourselves, I'll reply as I am able.

17 hours ago I left this thread to go to sleep, which by God's wisdom humbles me daily with its requirements. I have since eaten, gone to class, inspected a home that my wife and I might be purchasing, gone through the market district to make a grocery trip, and gone to the library to check out a book. Shortly I will be studying for my classes for the rest of the week.

I don't understand why some of you think that I am cowardly for not having the resources to attend to this thread twenty four hours a day, but I will do my best to answer the questions with time. You should probably also be aware that I have over twenty thousand posts on this site before the new forums took effect, and am approaching ten thousand posts on another atheist website. So, though I am a proud sinner who needs God's grace constantly to be a civil person, I'm not emotionally thin skinned or ignorant of your arguments.

So, give me the same grace you give yourselves, I'll reply as I am able.

Why does a different author necessarily make the text untrue? As you say, there is no author claimed. If it was written by 2 other people, or 30 other people, what's the problem?

Well, if the author or authors are unknown, the claim of the Gospels being eye-witness accounts becomes even more dubious.

Quote from: Astreja

There are also suggestions in the texts that the stories were written after the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE.

Quote from: Fool

Such as?

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"Do you see all these great buildings?" replied Jesus. "Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down." (Mark 13:2)

This is presented as a "prophesy" but it strongly suggests that Mark (or at least that section of Mark) was written after the Temple had already been destroyed. A similar controversy exists regarding the dating of the book of Daniel, with some scholars claiming that the prophesies therein were composed after the events they supposedly predict.